God is Light

Achariya George Adams
Speaks on "God is Light" 
Sunday, January 24, 2016

This Sunday we have chosen for our meditation the subject, “God is Light!”  This truth has been revealed to humanity in all times and all lands.  In the ancient Gayatri prayer, we are admonished to meditate on that 'effulgent' reality from whom the whole universe is projected.  The prophet Mohammed tells us, “God in the Light of the Heavens and the Earth.”  Zarathustra refers to God as “Ahura Mazda,” the Supreme Light and the blessed Nazarene tells us, “If thine eye be single thy whole body shall be full of light.”

The light of God is both a spiritual ideal and a reality.  As a spiritual ideal the light of God illumines the path of our daily life and guides us as we seek to unfold our innate divinity to its absolute perfection.  As a reality, the light of God is revealed to us in our meditation as our soul. In our soul, we are one with the reality of God. In the words of the Prophet Moses, “I am that I am.” In the words of Jesus of Christ Consciousness, “I and my Father are one.”  In the words of our Vedic ancestors, “I am Brahman, the Absolute Self.”

The symbol for the wisdom of God is light.  At our soul essence, we are comprised of three constituent qualities, wisdom, life and love.  On our altar we represent these qualities of soul with effulgent light, fragrant incense and consecrated water. Self-transformation comes to that individual who is able to unfold these qualities in his or her life.  In the words of Christ, “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven."

—Achariya George

From the Gurus and Swamis: AUM

"The knowledge and realization of truth usher in the era of illumination. Truth alone is the eternal light. Only in the revelation of truth is the everlasting good attained."
 
—Sayings of Shyamacharan Lahiri. translation by Swami Premananda
 
"Darkness may reign in a cave for thousands of years, but bring in the light, and the darkness vanishes as though it had never been. Similarly, no matter what your defects, they are yours no longer when you bring in the light of goodness. So great is the light of the soul that incarnations of evil cannot destroy it."
 
—Swami Yogananda Paramhansa, "Where There Is Light" 
 
"Thou alone art the light of my soul. Let the effulgence of thy divinity touch my mind, heart and consciousness that I may unfold thy attributes within me until thou and I become one in absolute perfection. What a heaven of light, love and bliss there must be where soul meets God and God is revealed in his cosmic glory."
 
—Swami Premananda, "The Inner Path to God"
 
"In our thoughts and meditation we are gradually revisualizing our life by the light of God. We are building our own spiritual home, a temple furnished and filled with the light of all the noble virtues of our own souls. We are making our own body a temple, a temple in which we meet God." 
 
—Swami Kamalanandam, "The Mystic Cross"

Noble Thoughts: "Let Noble Thoughts come to us from every side."

—Rig Veda

"Meditate.
Live purely. Be quiet.
Do your work with mastery. 
Like the moon, come out from behind the clouds!
Shine!

—Buddha

"Faith is the bird that feels the light and sings when the dawn is still dark."

—Rabindranath Tagore

"Every man must decide whether he will
walk in the light of creative altruism
or in the darkness of destructive selfishness.
 
—Martin Luther King, Jr.

"I salute the light within your eyes
where the whole universe dwells."
 
—American Indian